Field
The disclosed concept relates generally to anti-counterfeiting measures, and more particularly, to a device and method for authenticating articles, tracking articles, detecting the diversion of articles, and detecting the production of unauthorized articles. The disclosed concept further relates to articles employing optically variable security devices.
Description of Related Art
In the consumer products industry, counterfeiting is a significant and growing problem. Fashion and luxury products have long been the target of counterfeiters, but nearly any branded product can be and has been the subject of counterfeiting. For example, products such as shampoo, automotive parts, baby formula, pharmaceuticals, candy, and even beer have been counterfeited. Branded, certified and copyrighted products are especially common targets of counterfeiting. Counterfeiting is difficult to detect, investigate, and quantify, and consequently, it is difficult for brand owners to know the full extent of the problem. However, by some estimates, between 5 and 7 percent of all world trade is in counterfeit products, amounting to an annual value that could rise to nearly $1 trillion in 2009.
In a traditional counterfeiting scheme, an individual or group of individuals produces, packages, and attempts to sell products with the intent to deceptively represent the product's authenticity and/or source. Typically, the quality of the counterfeit is less than the original product the counterfeit was designed to imitate. Consequently, consumers that unknowingly purchase counterfeit products are being defrauded. In some cases, such as with drugs, medicines, and automotive parts, when a consumer unknowingly purchases a counterfeit product, the results can be dire.
Counterfeiting has a significant impact on brand owners as well. Perhaps the most obvious negative effect counterfeiting has on companies is lost revenue and profit. Less obvious but equally important is the potential damage counterfeits can cause to a company's brand equity. For example, a single highly-publicized negative incident caused by the use of a counterfeit can cause immeasurable damage to a company's reputation.
The cost to society of counterfeit products is significant. Revenues from selling counterfeits support various nefarious activities including syndicated crime, prostitution, human-trafficking, child labor, and terrorist activities. Counterfeiting contributes to unemployment, helps create budget deficits, and poses a threat to global health and safety.
Documents, particularly those of value and those that are certified, for example and without limitation, banknotes, bonds, checks, credit cards, stamps, tickets, coupons, passports, identification (ID) cards, licenses, and certificates, are also widely counterfeited. Counterfeit identity documents are commonplace and often used in identity theft crimes.
Several techniques have been used, developed, or proposed for preventing the counterfeiting of products and documents. The development of trademarks and logos (i.e., branded products) and document seals were early attempts by manufacturers and document providers to verify to consumers the origin of their products and documents. However, it is relatively easy for a counterfeiter to copy trademarks, logos, and seals.
A more recent technique aimed at preventing counterfeiting is to attach radio frequency identification (RFID) tags to products when they are initially manufactured or packaged. A product can later be authenticated by verifying the unique identifying data transmitted by the RFID tag. However, adding an RFID tag to each product increases the overall cost of the product. Further, the equipment (e.g., RFID sensors or readers) needed to verify the RFID tag are costly and may only be available to certain entities in the product's distribution chain, and are almost certainly not available to consumers. In addition, the RFID tags themselves and the codes within them are also subject to counterfeiting. Thus, this technique is neither effective nor economical.
Yet another approach to preventing counterfeiting is the marking of products, documents, labels, or product packaging with an identifying mark in a format that is difficult or impossible to counterfeit, such as color-shifting inks, tamper labels, watermarks, intaglio inks, ultraviolet inks, and other devices that are difficult to copy. This technique also offers drawbacks. As copying and printing technologies become more sophisticated, economical, and available to counterfeiters, brand owners and document issuers must resort to more and more sophisticated labels and markings to keep one step ahead. This results in increased costs as brand owners must constantly develop and implement new markings that cannot be copied with current copying technology. It also results in an identifying mark that becomes so complex that it is often too confusing or difficult for consumers to recognize. Consequently, there remains a need for an effective and economical anti-counterfeiting system wherein it is easy for consumers to validate authenticity.
One marking technique well known in the art is the use of optically variable devices. An optically variable device (OVD) is a visual device that creates a change or shift in appearance, such as a change in color or shape, when observed from different relative observation points. The evolution of the OVD as a security device stems largely from its ability to exhibit optical effects that cannot be reproduced using traditional printing and/or photocopying processes. OVDs can be based on several technologies, such as for example and without limitation, holographic effects, diffractive gratings, liquid crystal effects, color-shifting inks or pigments, and micro-lens integral and autostereoscopic imaging techniques.
Despite advances in digital imaging technologies in recent years, the best color copiers and computer-based imaging systems available today are not capable of reproducing OVD images. OVDs can only be reproduced by sophisticated and expensive, often proprietary, processes and equipment that most counterfeiters lack. For example, sophisticated holographic origination equipment is needed to reproduce holographic OVDs. Thus, one of the important reasons OVDs continue to be used as security devices to prevent counterfeiting is that they defeat the widespread use of readily available imaging and printing technologies by those counterfeiters who, up to a certain level of skill and resources, might otherwise engage in counterfeiting and falsification of products and documents. Further, many counterfeiters are capable of producing and distributing large quantities of products or documents that, aside from the OVD security images, are indistinguishable from authentic versions. Thus, a second important reason for using OVDs as security devices to prevent counterfeiting is that they provide a focal point for distinguishing authentic products from those supplied by professional counterfeiters.
However, for perpetrators above this certain level of skill and resources, counterfeiting and falsification of products and documents continues to evolve. These perpetrators continue to invest in the technologies and skills necessary to duplicate even OVD security images. Thus, the use of OVD security images alone is insufficient to confirm the authenticity of false products or documents produced by counterfeiters having a certain level of skill and resources.
Another approach to preventing counterfeiting is the marking of products, documents, labels, or product packaging with random or serialized numbers or symbols that are either encrypted or stored in a central database. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 6,442,276 discloses a method of verifying the authenticity of a product by marking the product with a random code number and storing the code number in a database. The product's authenticity is verified by comparing the number marked on the product with numbers stored in the database. However, the method does not protect against the counterfeiting of code numbers; faced with two products that have both been marked with the same valid number, the method cannot distinguish between a counterfeit product and an authentic product.
In a similar approach, a particular random characteristic of a product, document, label, or packaging is used to create a unique “fingerprint” of the article to be protected. These methods also have drawbacks. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,974,150 discloses a method of authenticating a product or document by affixing a label to the product or document into which fluorescent, dichroic fibers have been randomly embedded. The random pattern of the fibers is measured by a special apparatus and converted to a numeric code. The code is stored in a database and/or encrypted and printed on the label. At a remote site, another apparatus is used to measure the fiber pattern and the resulting code is compared with the code in the database or with the decrypted code appearing on the label. Although secure in verifying single articles, this method is unwieldy for mass produced products or documents because it introduces significant costs in the form of the special reading apparatus, which would be required everywhere in the field where authentication is desired. Further, it is likely that many consumers would not have access to one of the special readers, so will be unable to authenticate their products or documents.
Therefore, there is a need for a method and device to verify the authenticity of products and documents that is relatively low in cost, secure against counterfeits made by perpetrators of all levels of skill and resources, easy to apply, and easy to authenticate.